IUCr Commission on Magnetic Structures*

The Commission on Magnetic Structures (CMS) was established ad interim by the Executive Committee in January 2011 and confirmed at the Madrid General Assembly in August 2011.  It’s primary purpose is to facilitate research on the discovery and communication of magnetic structures in magnetically ordered materials; and its present focus is to cultivate a community consisting of interested participants from diverse fields of research, who can establish standards for defining and communicating the crystallographic details of magnetic structures.  The scope of the Commission’s consideration encompasses a broad range of magnetic structure types, including commensurate magnetic structures, modulated and otherwise aperiodic magnetic structures, low-dimensional magnetic structures, disordered magnetic structures, etc.

The commission’s terms of reference are as follows:

• Establish standards for the description and dissemination of magnetic structures and their underlying symmetries (representations of propagation vector group, ‘complete’ representation of the group necessary for multi-k structures, 3D magnetic Shubnikov space groups, superspace symmetry … ), and promote these standards within the IUCr and among other research communities that rely on magnetic structure information.
• Develop CIF standards for magnetic structures and promote their use in crystallographic software. This activity will be developed in collaboration with the IUCr Committee for the Maintenance of the CIF Standard (COMCIFS).
• Develop a database for magnetic structures based on the sharing of magnetic CIF files.
• Cooperate with other IUCr Commissions in establishing and maintaining standards of common interest, such as magnetic symmetry-group tables, magnetic nomenclature and magnetic form factor data.
• Encourage communication and cultivate consensus among research communities that have independently developed diverse approaches to characterizing and describing magnetic structures.
• Promote the sponsorship and organization of magnetic-structure sessions, symposia, workshops and schools at triennial congresses of the IUCr, at the meetings of its Regional Associates, and at the meetings of other professional societies that tend to rely heavily on magnetic structure information. This should include sessions dedicated to the analysis of neutron scattering data and magnetic X-ray scattering data.